CFP: Feminism in South Africa? (9/15/06; journal issue)

Post-apartheid South Africa is marked by its rapidly shifting culturalgeographies where the position of women illuminates critical issues abouthow the political and social structure negotiates its contradictions andsafe spaces. The idea of being simultaneously seen and unseen, included andexcluded, is familiar to studies on race and gender. While South Africa hasthe largest percentage of women in parliament in the world, it also has thehighest levels of rape. How do we make sense of these contradictoryindicators? The TRC brought issues surrounding women's abuse into the openbut the transcripts of its closed sessions on women's abuse wereinadvertently posted onto the internet, exposing victims to public scrutinyand assessment. Previously, sexual assault was used by apartheid forces as ameans of subjugation. Gender abuse within liberation movements also occurredwith these narratives only emerging more recently. How has South Africasynthesized these experiences? Historically, huge differences have shapedthe lives of South African women from different racial backgrounds. How hasthis shifted in post-Apartheid South Africa? What are the issues surroundinggender in South Africa in different sectors? With the Zuma trial pushingissues of women's rights into the national spotlight, how women's issues arerecast and appropriated are important indicators of where discourse residesin the present. In a period where Feminism has become decidedlyunfashionable in popular culture, what tools do we have to examine women inSouth African culture? Have feminist issues disappeared along with thepopularity of the ideology? What position do women occupy in South Africanculture today?Issues surrounding voice, victimhood, agency, subjectivity, power, gaze,silences, knowledge and nation have often been recast in African Feministtheory and need further exploration in South African today. Works dealingwith the ambiguities and complexities of gender in South African culture aresought for a special edition of the interdisciplinary journal AfricanStudies. Topics might include, but are not limited to:

- The relationship between race, class, gender and/or sexuality in contemporary South African culture.- Representations of women or gender relations in South African literature.- Reconsidering Feminist theory in a post-Apartheid context.- Gender, health issues and the state.- The media and gender representations.- Women and structural violence.- Gender dynamics and popular culture.- Historical contradictions and present manifestations.- Reading the silences or gaps in discourse around women.- The relationship between nationalism and gender politics.

Articles addressing any aspect of South African culture and women to be sentto Ronit Frenkel by 15 September 2006 – ronit_at_languages.wits.ac.za (MS wordformat).